Thursday, August 26, 2010

Let me start off by saying that I am going to do what every good blogger would tell me not to do. I am going to cram a zillion projects and pictures into one post. The reason? We started school today. OVERWHELMED would be an understatement for me right now! I realized today just how much Handsome Hubby balances me. When I am having a bad day or I am overwhelmed, he can always balance me out and bring me back to sanity!

I realized today that the older my kids get, the harder their school gets, and the more time and focus it is going to require from me. So, in an effort to be able to focus on my kids and their education - - instead of dragging this reveal out over a time span, you get it all today. So that tomorrow when I am trying to teach, I don’t have a blog post trying to compose itself in my head!! This also means that posts may be fewer and farther between, at least until we can figure out our new “normal.”

So, with that in mind, here is the final product!! There is still some work to be done, obviously I still need some stuff to put on the walls, but I don’t want to hang something there just because it is what I have, I want to put things that I love on the walls, so in the meantime, they are going to remain blank!

Before

After

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After

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After

As you can see, I have completely rearranged the room. Moving the bed in front of the window did three things: it finally gave me a place where the bed could be centered (all the other walls make the bed not centered on another area - - it just was not working for me), it helped make the room seem a little bit smaller compared to looking in through the doorway and seeing the long bed way on the other end, and lastly, it put it under the air vents in the ceiling so that we actually get some air at night instead of roasting!!

I was apprehensive of covering up the window, but with the two side windows, we still get plenty of natural sunlight and as a bonus, at night I can open the blind behind the bed and get a great view of the moon and stars!

One of the projects for this room was slip-covering this chair. I used the same method that I used for my dining room chair slipcovers, except that as I sewed the seams, I put a flat flange edging in the seam. You can find my tutorial on flat flange here. The chair was a fantastic Craigslist find - - chair and ottoman for $60. They were in great condition and super lightweight (always a plus when you move often and have weight restrictions!). The only thing wrong with it was that it is a yellow plaid, not the look I was going for in here, so it was the perfect candidate for a slipcover.

I wanted to bring some of the coral over to this side of the room, so I embroidered one of my birds onto the coral fabric and made it into a pillow.

This chaise was on etsy also - - except that it was a friend/client of mine who had it listed, so I traded pillows and cushions for it. It is my new favorite spot to lounge and read in my room!! I know the walls are still blank in that corner, but I am looking for the perfect lamp to go next to the chaise and I don’t know what I want for the walls yet!! :)

Next it was time for window treatments. I love this fabric. It is a vintage looking floral linen. If I had enough of this fabric I would have lined the walls with it!! It has the French blue in it that I have throughout my house along with the pop of coral and pink. Not enough coral and pink to make my husband hate it, just enough to give the room an unexpected pop of color! I made really simple balloon shades using shirring tape on the edges. The centers are just pinned so that when we move, I can adjust everything if the windows are a different size. On either side of the bed, I just hung the fabric in long panels to soften the edge between the headboard and the window frame.

This little settee was another craigslist find: $75. I absolutely love it! When I first started working on the room, I re-upholstered this in a blue/green velvet. It looked really pretty, until I put it in the room. Then I hated it. Every time I would start working on the room, I knew that something was wrong, but I just couldn’t put my finger on what it was. Then one day, I was playing around with my fabrics to go on my bed, when I set a piece of coral fabric on the settee. Suddenly I knew what was wrong - - the blue/green was not working in that room. I grabbed Cameron and together he and I ripped off the fabric and had the settee re-upholstered in 45 minutes flat (including ripping the old off!)!! Obviously it is an easily done piece. It uses the same techniques that I showed you in my re-upholstery 101 series.

I will admit that this project isn’t finished yet, I still have to put the double cording around all the edges. I was really hoping to be able to buy a finished braiding that would match the coral - - but I have not been able to find anything that even remotely matches.

This desk was my old sewing table. Needless to say, the top was very scratched up! I love this desk, I got it at a garage sale in CA for $30. I almost didn’t get it because I really wanted to talk them down to $20 (I’m cheap). I am so glad that I did splurge and spend the extra $10. Knowing how much I have used it and how sturdy it is, I would pay way more than that for it now! After having a sewing machine, pins, and scissors all leaving their mark on the top of it for the past three years, it was in need of some TLC. I decided to just give it a fresh coat of white paint and some new hardware.

Handsome Hubby has been asking for a place of his own where he can have his books and computer and be able to spread out without me telling him that I need more room to lay fabric out in his workspace! This is the perfect place for him. When he came home for R&R and I showed him that he had this spot all to himself, he couldn’t have been happier. Now, when he comes home for good and goes back to school to finish up those last 3 classes he needs for his Masters, he will have the perfect study spot just waiting for him!

Well, that is my Master bedroom in all it’s glory. Yes, it still has some gaps to fill in, but it much better than it was before. It works for me now. It kind of feels like a hotel room, with plenty of comfy seating, a desk to work at, and a big inviting bed! It is now one of my favorite rooms in the house!!

Tuesday, August 24, 2010

Wow! Your comments on yesterday's post really made my day. You all are so sweet. It is so nice to know that there are others out there who appreciate and acknowledge the sacrifice the entire military family makes. It won't be long before handsome hubby is home for good and we cannot wait! I'm sure you can’t either, you're probably sick of hearing me talk about deployments and deployment projects!

Have patience with me this week as I try to balance Handsome Hubby going back, coming off of a weeks vacation at the beach, customers orders that have been put aside for three weeks, and of course, our home school starting on Thursday. We are excited to start our new school year, but I should could have used a couple more weeks of summer! Who am I kidding, if I were to have two more weeks of summer, I would still be saying I wasn’t ready for the school year to start!!

Well, as promised, this week I am going to show you the finished master bedroom. For today I am going to show you the before pictures and also a few sneak peeks at the fabrics and some of the details in the finished room.

This room is huge! We have never in our married life had a room so big. Honestly, it has taken me so long to do this room because I don't know what to do with all the space! Here is how it was laid out before.

Do you see how much room there is in here?

Overwhelmingly huge!

There is no real good way to lay the room out. Notice,this one whole corner just turned into a storage area for all things that didn't have a home.I finally got sick of it all,and when my friend Kristi came to visit,we completely rearranged the room.Tomorrow I will show you the new layout we came up with.

Re-doing the room involved lots of projects! Re-finishing an old desk (actually my old sewing table).

Adding new hardware.

Making a couple slipcovers.

All new fabrics for the windows and bed.

And of course a re-upholstery project. Have I peaked your interest now? Tomorrow I will show you the actual projects and take my Deployment Project count close to #200! I cannot believe how many projects I have gotten done while Handsome Hubby has been gone!!

Monday, August 23, 2010

I’m back! Did you miss ? Wow! It has been a crazy three weeks! I have missed all of you in blog land!

Handsome Hubby came home three weeks ago and it was a wonderful time of reuniting as a family and enjoying one another's company. We hugged and laughed and cried and enjoyed every moment together!

After handsome hubby got home we took a little vacation to southern Virginia to a friends family farm where we rode horses, went hiking, jumped in the creek, ate amazingly good food and hung out as a family.

We had an adventurous trip home when Cameron came down with a fever and the air conditioning went out on the track halfway home, it was hot hot trip. We ended up going to the doctors first thing in the morning when we got home and found out Cameron had an ear infection and strep throat. Charise, not wanting to be left behind followed in her brother's footsteps and had a fever two days later. We ended up just staying home the rest of the time and enjoying each other's company. We had lots of family movie nights and played lots of games together. The two weeks went by really fast and were over much sooner than we were ready to let Handsome Hubby go back. :(

Handsome Hubby left on Friday morning and on Saturday morning the kids and I left for North Carolina for a week at the beach. We went with four other families from church and had a fabulous time hanging out, eating the best food ever, relaxing on the beach, staying up way too late, and laughing way too hard! It was just what the doctor ordered! It was perfect timing for the kids and I to get our minds off of daddy leaving.

(I would love to share pictures of all of this, but my camera is acting up and will not let me download the pictures)

After we were done at the beach we loaded everything back into the truck and headed three hours down the road to Fort Bragg to go and visit friends there. Cameron's best friend from Fort Irwin lives there. I surprised Cameron and took him to visit his friend. It just so happens, that his mom and I are great friends to! He said it was the best surprise ever! In fact, we had so much fun that I forgot to even get the camera out.

Now I am trying to catch up from being out of the house for three weeks. School starts on Thursday and this mama/teacher is so not ready for it to start.! I've got lots of projects to show you this week and I did finish the master bedroom before handsome hubby got home, so I'm going to be showing you the bedroom all throughout the week! Big yay!!! I am so excited to show you the finished product I think it turned out beautiful and Handsome Hubby absolutely loved it! He kept saying the entire time he was home that it was just like a hotel room and it was the only room he wanted to hang out in. What a compliment!

Well, part of coming back to reality is the 15 loads of laundry I now need to do, and then I must start getting myself to bed at a decent hour! Thanks so much for waiting patiently for a new post while I enjoyed time with my Handsome Hubby!

Just Me!!

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Who? Me?

I'm a very happy, very busy wife to the most handsome soldier in the world! A sometimes crazy homeschool mom, who does not take lightly the privilege that I have to be home with my two fabulous kiddos teaching them the basics of school and hopefully shaping them into, "a compassionate Godly leader" and "a respectable young lady who loves Jesus!" I love to be creative and frugal at the same time!

I enjoy anything creative. My sewing machine and I are inseparatable and you can find me sitting at it most days after we finish school. I love anything to do with fabric. Quilting, making bags, attempting to make clothes... but my favorite is mixing fabric and furniture. I love making slipcovers and re-upholstering furniture.

Currently I am trying to fill my time with projects while Handsome Hubby is deployed. I'm not really sure what time I am trying to fill since I keep myselft quite busy with taking care of the home and kids, homeschooling, grocery shopping, making meals, taking care of the vehicles and of course laundry. Laundry, laundry and more laundry!!!